Labor Day Weekend

We had a very busy weekend. We went to the Iron County Fair Rodeo and Arlee did the "Beautiful Baby" contest. On Sunday we went to a friends baby blessing, and on Monday we went on a hike up Parowan Canyon with the Sorensen bunch.

The theme was, "When I grow up I want to be..." I made Arlee's skirt, headband, and barefoot sandals. I originally made it for her to be "Daddy's girl" (Which is why I made Cody dress in camo and take her up for judging), but when we got there Cody suggested she be a "Cabella's Model" :) I loved it. She didn't win...the winner was wearing a sailor's dress and carrying a flag...guess we should have gone more patriotic :)

She didn't win...the winner was wearing a sailor's dress and carrying a flag...guess we should have gone more patriotic :) Arlee met her friend Rauzin for the first time. She just loves looking at other babies!

Most of our Arlee pictures are with her Daddy, so Cody thought we should get some with mommy. Just look at our beautiful girl!

And Arlee wasn't done with her smiles so we snapped a few more:

There is a short waterfall hike up Parowan Canyon that is so cool and perfect for taking a baby. Daddy packed her the whole way and we took lots of pictures.

Arlee was not so happy about the her toes in the cold water:

I love this picture of Cody and Arlee:

Our friendly little girl is always happy to talk to new people. On this trip she really liked talking to and smiling at Alieslyn (sp?) who is her cousin's cousin.

Our big girl!

It feels like Arlee has grown up twice as fast in the last week as she as in the last 4 months. She is learning so many new things it is hard to keep up with her! She's always been very aware and alert but all of a sudden it is like she sees EVERYTHING, and now she can get to most things too. She is grabbing onto everything and rolling to get things. This morning she was rolling away from her diaper change. She rolled over for the first time from her back to belly on Saturday and I missed it! Cody and my parents got to see her though. On Sunday she was figuring out the rolling even more and today she was quite the show off! She was so proud everytime she rolled over. (That could be because she gets a huge cheer from her doting parents everytime) When she rolls over, she's usually trying to get somewhere. Sometimes she can scoot herself a bit and she tries so hard, but she gets really frustrated because she can't get as far as she'd like. We fed her rice cereal for the first time on Thursday and she loved it! She ate it really well too. She started to shriek when she could see the spoon was close. When I was feeding her today she was laughing in between bites.

And finally (really this should be first because she's been doing this the longest): This girl loves her toes! When she doesn't have pants on and especially when I'm changing her diaper, her legs go up and she's got her toes.

3 months

It blows my mind that my baby girl is 3 months old. Arlee and I are loving every minute of my stay at home mommyhood...and we are loving living in the same apartment as daddy again. When I had to go back to work for the last 3 weeks of school daddy had to stay in Cedar. Here are some 3 month stats: •Arlee was 11.12 oz at exactly 3 months. •She rolls to her side •She likes to push up on her legs and stand or sit up to watch everything around her •We still can't get her to take her binkie very often, but she likes to suck on mommy or daddy's arm or finger..whatever she can get that isn't her binkie. •She really likes the play gym. She is good at hanging on the rings and pulling on them. •She loves the big loud smooches that Daddy and Grandma Great (Cody's Grandma Quilter) give her! •She likes sitting up in her bumbo •When she hasn't seen someone for awhile she will pull out her pouty lips. Her 2 grandpas both achieved pouty lip status Friday night. It was pretty funny. Once she got used to them she wouldn't do it anymore so we didn't grab a picture of it. -She grasps everthing she can, mostly blankets and her taggie toys now.

She likes to argue with mommy.

officially 4 months!

I didn't try to take pictures on her official 4 month date until about 7 at night. Cody was gone (checking our future house in Enoch for any flooding) and she wanted to play, not sit in her bumbo or do tummy time :)

"OH hey!"

Some playtime with daddy: She sure loves that daddy!

We went to visit my friend and her baby that is one month younger than Arlee. When we had them facing eachother, Arlee started smiling really big at Kaylee. She does this evertime she meets another baby. She's our sweet friendly girl!

3.5 months

I can't believe how much Arlee is changing everyday. These last 2 weeks she has gone through so many phases and they go so fast! 2 weeks ago at her blessing she was still sticking out her lizard-long tongue like crazy, but then she abruptly stopped. I think the Mortensens taught her how to talk LOUD. Sunday night she started talking loud to Grandpa Andy and then all week everything that came out of her mouth was LOUD! it was so funny. When she'd play under her activity gym, it was like her toys had cotton in their ears and she was trying to get their attention. She's also been rolling on her sides a lot and she doesn't hate tummy time anymore! A big Woot Woot! So I think the rolling over will come soon. She's been looking for something to naw on (usually its our fingers or hands) so we got her a teether. She can hang on to it and usually hold it in her mouth. She really likes it. Oh and she LOVES her play gym. She quickly figure out how to grasp onto the toys. She can hold one in each hand and pull them around and make her little sun make its noises. Lately she has been holding onto the toys with her hands and playing with the other toys with her feet. The last two days she has been sucking on her bottom lip, making gurgling noises and blowing bubbles. She has also figured out how to just suck on two of her fingers instead of her whole fist. Oh my goodness, watching all her changes makes me so proud to be her mommy. It also makes me sad that she is growing so fast. She now eats about every 3 hours (until evening time when she wants to eat more often). And she eats pretty fast now...Only about 20 min. tops. I was worried at first, but she keeps gaining weight and she never acts hungry after so she has just gotten to be a quick eater like her Daddy. My pregnancy seems like such a long time ago, and it is crazy to think about a time when I didn't know her and get to see her sweet smile. I am so grateful for our little darling.

She really likes to hang onto us these days and will search and reach out until she makes contact.

4 Months!

As Cody says, I can't believe Arlee is not our "itty bitty" anymore. She really is getting so big and discovering new things everyday. She has discovered her toes. She puts her feet together and plays with them, reaches for her toes (She can almost get them to her mouth), and pushes her feet up against the play gym. As soon as you take her diaper off to change her, her feet go up in the air to meet her hands. She has been sucking on her bottom lip a lot (Cody says she learned this from watching him play with his flavor savor :) ) and when she sleeps she sucks on her tongue. She loves telling daddy stories at the end of the day. When he gets home, she has lots of big smiles for him. She still pulls her little shy cock of the head for him too. So cute. She also still really likes blowing bubbles and she will spend a lot of time blowing bubbles at "that baby in the mirror" Arlee has always liked when Mommy sings to her (finally an audience that appreciates me singing), but recently she has really liked "Three little ducks" and "3 Little Speckled Frogs". If I sing them relentlessly in the car, it calms down her normal car fussies. Though we still get the big car blowouts, they don't happen everytime we get in the car like they used to. Her grip is getting better every day. She can grip the skinny bar on her piano toy and her binkie handle. She has started reaching for so many things too (i.e. the remotes and my phone). I think she must really be noticing colors now too. She got so excited when Cody held her up in front of the juice aisle at the store and she reaches for my cups of juice. She went through a stage where she would fall asleep just by rocking her in the rocking chair, but that is over. She must have decided that her mommy needs more exercise, because she now insists on being bounced...and she fights her naps hard! She has shown a little more interest in her binkie recently though, but mostly with playing with it and gnawing on it.

She sucks on her 2 little fingers a lot more at sleepy times now. The other night she fell asleep with them in her mouth and I thought, "I've officially got a finger sucker." She is still waking up at least once a night, but now I'm just happy if its not twice a night. She usually goes to sleep about 10-10:30 and wakes up for good between 6 and 8 (depending on how willing she is to go back to sleep and give mommy an extra morning nap :)

She reaches up to play with the hair that she doesn't really have and she has started to pull her headbands off, so I can't put them on until we get where we're going other wise I will find it down around her neck in the carseat. The other day we were coming back from getting the laundry. I took the laundry up the steps and I turned around to get her and this is what I found:

She pulled the clip off too and is playing with it. These days she will only sit in her bumbo for awhile before she gets bored and starts arching her back to get out. Mostly she just doesn't like to sit--she likes to stand.

Maternity Shoot

A couple weeks ago (when I was 38 weeks) my friend Michelle took some pictures for us. Didn't she do a great job?! Best part about it is when when we got them back Cody said, "Those are really neat, I'm glad we got those done." Ha that is saying a lot for some who usually gets grumpy when it's picture time. He was game for a few, but he wasn't impressed with some of the poses we wanted to try...or how many we did. Here are some of our favorites.

Sealed March 3rd in the St. George Temple

Cody and I were sealed on March 3rd. I was 33 weeks. Our little girl must have been very excited for us because she was quite the active little girl that day.

Some Things for Baby Girl

Once I was off track for my last few weeks of pregnancy I finally had some time to make a couple of baby things.
Car Seat Tent: I loved the purple flower fabric and I didn't want pink for the back but for some reason, I didn't realize just how gray it all would be on the gray car seat. Oh well :)
Cowgirl "boot"ies: I'm really excited about how these turned out. I got them done in time to use them in our maternity shoot. I can't wait to post some of those.

20 weeks in November:

22 weeks . . .When I could still fit in my skinny jeans (with elastic bands)

Almost 25 weeks at Christmas. One of my students gave me some fun socks, so I decided to make the most of it and be an elf for Christmas :)


30 weeks in February:

32 Weeks: